Cold spray processes and thermal spray processes, such as high velocity oxygen fuel spray processes (HVOF) or plasma spray for example, use fine powders. Available powder feeders may prove to be ill-adapted for dealing with fine powders, as fine powders are prone to clogging, agglomeration, accumulation on walls, and powder coagulation, in particular for HVOF processes, which tend to use finer and finer powders. For cold spray coating processes, in addition to the abovementioned problems, currently available powder feeders are typically limited in terms of operating pressures.
There is still a need in the art for a powder feeder method and system overcoming recurrent problems of the art.